Seymour Morris Jr.'s American History Revised: 200 Startling Facts That Never PDF

“American heritage Revised is as informative because it is interesting and funny. choked with irony, surprises, and long-hidden secrets and techniques, the booklet does greater than revise American heritage, it reinvents it.” —James Bamford, bestselling writer of The Puzzle Palace, physique of secrets and techniques, and The Shadow Factory

This lively reexamination of yankee heritage delves into our previous to show enormous quantities of startling proof that by no means made it into the textbooks, and highlights how little-known humans and occasions performed strangely influential roles within the nice American story.

We are likely to consider historical past as settled, set in stone, yet American historical past Revised finds a previous that's jam-packed with ironies, surprises, and misconceptions. residing in another country for twelve years gave writer Seymour Morris Jr. the chance to view his kingdom as an intruder and forced him to ascertain American heritage from a clean point of view. As Morris colorfully illustrates throughout the 2 hundred ancient vignettes that make up this booklet, a lot of our nation’s prior is kind of different—and way more remarkable—than we thought.

We detect that:

• within the Fifties Ford used to be approached through jap businesses begging for a three way partnership. Ford declined their deals, calling them makers of “tin cars.” the 2 businesses have been Toyota and Nissan.
• Eleanor Roosevelt and so much women’s teams antagonistic the equivalent Rights Amendment
forbidding gender discrimination.
• the 2 generals who ended the Civil struggle weren’t supply and Lee.
• the number one bestselling American booklet of all time was once written in a single day.
• The Dutch made a foul funding deciding to buy long island for $24.
• younger ladies aimed sometime to turn into First Lady—and succeeded.
• 3 times, a personal financier stored the us from bankruptcy.

Organized into ten thematic chapters, American historical past Revised plumbs American history’s a number of inconsistencies, twists, and turns to make it come alive back.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nick Kotz deals the 1st thorough account of the complicated operating courting among Lyndon Baines Johnson and Martin Luther King Jr. Tracing either leaders’ paths, from Johnson’s ascension to the presidency in 1963 to King’s assassination in 1968, Kotz describes how they shaped a cautious alliance that will turn into instrumental in generating the most enormous civil rights laws in American background: the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the vote casting Rights Act of 1965.

Moon highlight Savannah and the Georgia Coast is a 145-page compact advisor protecting historical Savannah and the Golden Isles, together with Brunswick and Glynn County, Jekyll Island, St. Simon’s Island, Darien and McIntosh County, Cumberland Island, St. Mary’s, and the Okefenokee Swamp.

Author Jim Morekis bargains professional recommendation on must-see points of interest, and contains maps with sightseeing highlights so that you could make the main of your time.

This light-weight consultant is jam-packed with tips about leisure, purchasing, recreations, lodgings, foodstuff, and transportation, making navigating those ancient parts basic and relaxing.

Within the thirty years after the Civil struggle, the USA blew by way of nice Britain to develop into the best financial energy in international heritage. that could be a famous interval in historical past, while titans like Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and J. P. Morgan walked the earth.

But as Charles R. Morris indicates us, the platform for that impressive progress spurt was once inbuilt the 1st 1/2 the century. by way of the 1820s, the US used to be already the world’s most efficient producer, and the main intensely commercialized society in background. The battle of 1812 jumpstarted the nice New England cotton turbines, the iron facilities in Connecticut and Pennsylvania, and the forges round the nice Lakes. within the decade after the struggle, the Midwest used to be opened by way of marketers. during this superbly illustrated e-book, Morris paints a vibrant landscape of a brand new state humming with the paintings of production. He additionally issues out the parallels and alterations within the 19th century American/British standoff and that among China and the US this present day.

Basing his story on striking unique examine, historian Alexander Rose unearths the unforgettable tale of the secret agent ring that helped the United States win the innovative warfare. For the 1st time, Rose takes us past the battlefront and into the shadowy underworld of double brokers and triple crosses, covert operations and code breaking, and unmasks the brave, unsuitable people who inhabited this desert of mirrors—including the spymaster on the center of all of it, George Washington.

“Fascinating . . . Spies proved to be the tipping aspect in the summertime of 1778, supporting Washington commence breaking the stalemate with the British. . . . [Alexander] Rose’s booklet brings to mild their the most important assist in profitable American independence. ”—Chicago Tribune

“[Rose] captures the human measurement of spying, conflict and management . . . from the naive twenty-one-year-old Nathan Hale, who used to be captured and accomplished, to the quietly crafty Benjamin Tallmadge, who prepared the hoop in 1778, to the traitorous Benedict Arnold. ”—The Wall road magazine

“Rose supplies us intrigue, crossed indications, derring-do, and a valuable slice of eighteenth-century lifestyles. think about Alan Furst with muskets. ”—Richard Brookhiser, writer of Founding Father

“A compelling portrait of [a] rogues’ gallery of barkeeps, misfits, hypochondriacs, part-time smugglers, and full-time neurotics that would remind each reader of the solid of a John le Carré novel. ”—Arthur Herman, nationwide evaluate

Extra info for American History Revised: 200 Startling Facts That Never Made It into the Textbooks

Example text

They did not stop the further organization of labor societies nor wholly prevent the use of strikes and boycotts. When employers resorted to the courts, however, workingmen were hard pressed to defend themselves against charges of conspiracy. Growth of Labor Organization If these cases were a first blow at the early movement for labor organization, the new unions were soon confronted by a much more serious threat to their existence. In 1819, the country suffered a severe depression. As business activity was curtailed and the demand for labor automatically declined, even skilled workers found it increasingly difficult to get jobs.

ALUA, WSU A membership certificate for the United Mine Workers of America, 1890s. Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-2082 Chapter 3 The Workingmen’s Parties I n urging its members to nominate candidates for public office, the Mechanics’ Union of Trade Associations in Philadelphia broke fresh ground for labor and inaugurated what was to become a widespread political movement of work-ingmen’s parties. It soon spread to other towns in Pennsylvania; to New York, where wide popular support developed, not only for local parties in New York City itself, but also in many upstate localities; and into Massachusetts and other parts of New England.

This new association grew out of a strike of carpenters who were demanding a ten-hour day and had obtained the support of such other members of the building trades as the bricklayers, painters, and glaziers. The strike failed, but the experience in working together led to a call for more permanent organization. All existing labor societies were asked to join the association, and those trades that had no unions were requested to organize at once and send delegates. The Mechanics’ Union was not primarily concerned with such limited goals as higher wages and shorter hours, even though it had grown out of a strike for the ten-hour day.